System of transportation control



H. T. SMITH.

SYSTEM OF TRANSPORTATION CONTROL.

APPLICATION FILED MAY 17, 1920- Patented Oct. 18, 1921.

Inventor.

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PATENT OFFICE.

HERBERT THOMAS SMITH, OF TORONTO, ONTARIO, CANADA.

SYSTEM OF TRANSPORTATION CONTROL.

Application filed May 17,

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, HERBERT THOMAS SMITH, a subject of the King of Great Britain, and resident of the city of Toronto,

., county of York, Province of Ontario, in the Dominion of Canada, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Systems of Transportation Control, described in the following specification and illustrated in the accompanying drawings, that form part of the same.

The principal objects of the invention are, to effect an improvement in the operation of an urban passenger service, increasing the speed of service and rendering transportation more comfortable and more readily available.

A further object is to effect a saving in power and in the wear and tear of rolling stock, tracks, etc., resulting in a greater mileage for the cost of operation.

A still further object is to relieve congestion of trafiic in urban centers.

The principal feature of this invention consists in a novel system of operating the cars, whereby the cars are arranged in designated progression and stopping points are arranged in similarly designated progression, thus providing that succeeding cars stop at progressively different points.

In the carrying into effect of this invention, the cars on any particular route are designated by means of numerals, signals or otherwise in groups of two, three, four or more as required and according to the number of separate designations in the groups so are the stops arranged, that is to say, if there are three forms of cars designated by color scheme of red, green and yellow the stops will be arranged likewise and my system is based on the fact that a car stops only at the station carrying a corresponding designation, red car at a red stop and a green car at a green and a yellow car at a yellow stop.

It will be well known to the public that like cars only stop at like stations and it will be no hardship for the stations or stops will be arranged as frequently as may be desired but when disembarking, if persons desire to get out at a certain street, they may not be able to do so, but with a three color system they can only be one block away from the street they desire to reach, that is, they can et 01f at either the Specification of Letters Patent.

Patented Oct. 18, 1921.

1920. Serial No. 382,058.

near or far side of the station they desire according to the color scheme.

Such an arrangement will provide that each car in the system will run a minimum of three blocks between stops. This will mean a very great saving of time over present systems. It will reduce the loss of time in starting and stopping to one third. It will consequently reduce the waste of energy in starting the car three times instead of once and it will very materially lengthen the life of the whole equipment as the brakes will'not be applied so frequently and the car subjected to the strains of stopping and starting at the same intervals.

Such a system will enable the entire transportation scheme to be run at a much faster speed, because it will not be hampered by the speed of its slowest vehicle and if all the cars in a system travel a minimum of three blocks without stop, although these stops are at different points, the whole system will be accelerated. Two thirds of the time wasted in stopping will be saved. Two-thirds of electrical energy used in bringing the car up to full speed after stopping, two thirds of the impetus of the car when at full speed will be saved as against the loss of such in stopping at every station and two-thirds of the wear and tear upon the rails and rolling stock will be saved.

The system may be operated with a two stop arrangement or the cars may stop only at every fourth stop.

It will be readily seen that the service will be much more eflicient, for supposing .that a person has just missed a car on his street because of the extra speed, he probably would not have to wait any longer than he does now for by walking to the next street he could get a car of the next succeeding si 'nal and no time would be lost.

11 the event of the stops being a longer distance apart adjusting stations may be arranged at certain places where all cars are required to stop, such as railway crossings, bridges, etc, and a person getting on to a red car and desiring to get off at a yellow stop inthe outlying districts where stops are quite a distance apart, may transfer at a transfer point to a yellow car.

A system such as described is illustrated in the accompanying diagram where successive cars in the system are designated R, G. & Y. representing red, green and yellow and the stations or stopping places are similarly named.

It will be seen that the red car will only stop at every third stop labeled R, while the green car will stop at only the green stops and the yellow car will only stop at yellow stops, consequently a car will stop at each stop but when a person desires to get ofi they may have to walk a block in either direction from a point of alighting to their desired destination but such conditions exist in the present systems as practically no systern in large urban districts allow their cars to stop at every street.

What I claim as my invention is A system of transporation control, consisting in designating the cars on the route with consecutive differentiating signals in groups of three and arranging along the route signal points in corresponding diiferentiating series and stopping cars only at points where the car signals correspond with the stationary signals.

HERBERT THOMAS SMITH. 

